XBOX ONE REVEALED

Starting fresh Microsoft have named their new console the Xbox One.

Integrating the Xbox with voice controlled TV and game switching seems to be a significant focus. Lets take a look at some of the console images of the new XBox One and its controller...

The new Xbox One is keeping to its name and looks very boxed in style and shape. The new look certainly isnt boring though. Designed to be modern yet non-intrusive. It will probably sit very stylishly under your modern flat screen. Very few front facing features interfere with the shiny black facia.



Capitalising on the Microsoft ownership of Skype, it was obvious that the new XBox One would come with an integrated Skype feature.

The control mechanism, once the hand held gamepad, seems to have shifted over to remoteless voice activated commands.

Simply starting a command with the word "Xbox" followed by the specific requirement "Internet Explorer" seems to be the new way to browse the consoles features. Obviously we would have to try these features out ourselves to see how well the voice commands work when you have a screaming child in the room or music playing.

"Xbox, my child is too noisy for you to hear me" or "Xbox you cant hear me over the movie you are playing"

MS are claiming that the Xbox One is the beginning of truly intelligent TV and truly intelligent gaming

MS break down the Xbox One into 3 areas

The console - "The heart of the system is RAW power", 8 Core CPU, 5 Billion transistors, 8GB of RAM, Blue ray drive, wifi direct, native 64bit, USB 3.0.

"Practically silent operation. A powerful box engineered to deliver now and well into the future"

3 input devices - Kinect, controller, smart glass

Obviously that last part always leaves us wondering just how far into the future? Modern PCs are coming with 12GB and 16GB as standard, but we are impressed by the 8 CPU cores. Although consoles aim for a 10 year life expectancy and again we are not sure if 8 CPU cores will really look that impressive in 2 years let alone 10.

Android 4.1.2 update to Galaxy Tab 7.0 Plus

Good news for Samsung Galaxy Tab 7.0 Plus owners. According to SamMobile, Samsung has started rolling out the Android 4.1.2 Jelly Bean update to this tablet.


The first country to receive this update is Austria, however, other regions should be getting the updates shortly. As usual, the Jelly Bean update would bring features such as Project Butter, Google Now and several other improvements under the hood.

If you are a Tab 7.0 Plus owner, check to see if the update is available in your region.

Source

Intel still on the tops of the semiconductor companies

Qualcomm fastest growing semiconductor company, Intel still on top says Gartner

Qualcomm, designers of the highly popular Snapdragon series of chipsets plus a wide variety of wireless tech, is the fastest-growing semiconductor company according to Gartner. The two companies at the top, Intel and Samsung, were both affected by stagnation in the market in 2012.

Intel’s revenue slipped 3.1% year over year, but the company retained its leadership position for the 21st year in a row. Market share dropped a hair to 16.4% (down from 16.5%).

Samsung’s DRAM and NAND markets took a hit, but other segments picked up and the South Korean company managed a 3.1% year over year growth.

Qualcomm jumped into third position, up from 6th, with a massive 31.8% growth in revenue. That’s 18.2% better than analysts’ expectations. The company displaced Toshiba, who ranked fifth with a revenue decline of 9.8%.

Other than Qualcomm, only NXP managed to beat analysts’ expectations by over 10%. There are several companies that performed worse than expectations by over 10% too: Freescale, STMicroelectronics (who recently put an end to ST-Ericsson) and AMD.

Overall, Gartner gauged that the semiconductor industry declined 2.6% in total revenues in 2012 compared to 2011.

AMD has showcased their Radeon HD 7990

AMD has showcased their Radeon HD 7990 at the Game Developer Conference in San Francisco.

The GPU is said to be close to noiseless and would contain two cards from the 7900-series...

Various manufactures already released a GPU with two 7900-series cards on board, such as the Asus Ares II. These cards were mostly under-clocked in order to keep heat-issues suppressed.

AMD did not yet release the specs of the GPU, and neither were the clock rates announced. They did claim however that the GPU would receive different configurations than the GPU's from other manufacturers such as the Ares II.

The card will be powered by two 'eight-pin-plugs', whereas the current HD 7990 cards have three. The GPU will also contain four display-ports and one DVI-port. Furthermore, the GPU will be cooled by three 90-millimeter fans, which should make the GPU more or less noiseless, according to AMD.

Another point of interest are the expansion slots. Whereas current 7990-GPU's require three, AMD's upcoming GPU would require only two. These are all the currently available specifications, however AMD stated that the HD 7990 should be the competitor of Nvidia's Titan.

Galaxy S4 promo video

The Samsung Galaxy S4 promo video gives you the features rundown in little over 4 minutes

Samsung has posted the firstGalaxy S4 promo video on YouTube. As usual the clips goes through the phone’s design, software and hardware perks, and does so with a catchy background music and a patterned background to match the pattern of the smartphone itself.

We get to see Air View, which lets you hover a finger over the screen and get a thumbnail preview pop up. Smart Pause, which can monitor if your eyes move away from the screen and pause a video for you. See the S4 operated with gloves and much more.

Here’s the video itself. It’s 4:24 long so you may want to take a comfortable seat, before you press the play button

Asus announced first AMD based PCI Express 3.0 motherboard

PCI Express 3.0 technology was originally released a few years ago, but until now, it was only supported by Intel based motherboards. All the AMD based motherboards were using the reliable PCI Express 2.0 architecture for their dedicated video card needs, which wasn't as powerful as the newer PCIE 3.0.

The popular electronics provider Asus has recently announced the world's first AMD based motherboard that supports PCI Express 3.0 technology...


The Asus Sabertooth 990FX/Gen3 R2 is based on the AMD's 990FX chipset. It supports latest AMD's AM3+ processors which includes latest AMD FX series CPUs up to 8 Cores. It includes three PCI Express 3.0 slots allowing you to use multiple next generation video cards at their fully potential using Nvidia's SLI technology or AMD's CrossFireX technology. Asus has also equipped this motherboard with six SATA3 HDD ports, six USB 3.0 ports, twelve USB 2.0 ports, along with two E-SATA3 ports.

There have been no announcements yet about price or release dates.

AMD have traditionally been slightly cheaper than Intel; so this new motherboard will please longstanding fans who prefer their AMD products.

Nvidia Releases "Getforce GTX Titan" - Hardware Analysis

Numerous were the rumours about a Kepler GK110 GPU joining the GeForce Family. It first started with GeForce GTX 685 - later forgotten since it seemed NVIDIA was done with the 600 Series. After that, speculation turned towards a possible GeForce GTX Titan which was allegedly GeForce GTX 780 Ti, to go with NVIDIA's naming convention. Now the speculation is done and this is it folks - I present to you GeForce GTX Titan!

AMD claims to be happy with their Radeon HD 7000 Series GPU and showed a roadmap claiming that the HD 7000 Series GPUs are to be stable throughout 2013 and that they would be focusing on improving driver support. However, that doesn't mean there won't be new Radeon HD 8000 GPUs in 2013.

Now, NVIDIA is not holding back the big guns and has released what, as of February 2013, we call: the fastest single GPU available.

GeForce GTX Titan is based on the Kepler GK110 Core used on the Tesla K20 Workstation, but with only 14 SMX activated and so it offers 2688 Shader Processing Units, 48 ROPs and 224 TMUs on a 384-bit interface of fast GDDR5. The central clock runs at 837MHz and goes up to 876MHz in Turbo Mode, while the memory clock operates at 1502MHz. GeForce GTX Titan draws no more than 250 Watts. Early GeForce GTX Titan benchmarks indicate its performance is up to 85% of GeForce GTX 690!

Looking at the specifications on paper and what seems to be expected from GeForce GTX Titan, I would say this GPU has many major pros but an enormous major con, as well.

If it really does offer 85% of GeForce GTX 690's performance, while consuming only 250 Watt (exactly what Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition consumes), it's clear to say it's an extremely energy efficient GPU - well we didn't expect less from a Kepler based GPU. Adding to that, it's expected to heat much less than GeForce GTX 690 and to rely less on driver support.

With Titan comes a new technology called Kepler Boost 2.0.



Instead of just the regular Boost in which the GPU's central unit and Shaders speeds automatically raise themselves to a certain frequency (known as Engine Clock), GeForce GTX Titan features an upgraded version in which the GPU dynamically adjusts voltage based on its temperature and allows for an even higher frequency than Engine Clock known as Max Clock. This means that the lower the temperature, the higher the voltage and the higher the Max Clock.

Everything looks good but we have noticed that GeForce GTX Titan is priced around 900 American Dollars. This makes GeForce GTX Titan extremely uncompetitive. It's obvious a GPU of this magnitude, with over 7000 million transistors, has an extremely high manufacturing cost. However, such a high price will make it obsolete in the market. It's much more worthy getting a solution of Radeon HD 7970 Crossfire, which ends up costing less than 800 USD and performs better.

GeForce GTX Titan's price might not be final yet. In our opinion, if it remains that high, GeForce GTX Titan might end up only being bought by extremely rich gaming enthusiasts or benchmarking fanatics with a pretty penny. Unfortunately, that's less than 1% of the GPU market.

Needless to say, if playing Crysis 3, on the Ultra Preset, with 8xMSAA, on a 2560x1600 monitor, is your dream, GeForce GTX Titan is your "girl". The 288 GB/sec of memory bandwidth plus the 2688 Shader Processing Units, ought to do the job well. Adding to that, Crysis 3 is optimized for NVIDIA GPUs.

Now, the big question is: is this trouble for AMD?

Considering all this true, here's the relative performance of the top high end solutions:



Yeah, GeForce GTX 690 still takes the lead...

Here is their price:



As usual, AMD's top high end GPU costs less than NVIDIA's top high end GPU.

Let's not forget about a performance to watt ratio:



As mentioned, GeForce GTX Titan offers the best power consumption/Performance. Almost all NVIDIA GPUs are more energy efficient than AMD's.

and last, but certainly not least, a price to performance ratio:



Radeon HD 7970 has a clear win on this one while GeForce GTX Titan is smashed - even by NVIDIA's own GeForce GTX 690.

AMD: HD 8000 videocards coming on late 2013

As opposed to earlier rumours, AMD has stated they will be releasing their new videocard-series at the end of 2013, which will be based upon new GPU-architecture.

The previous rumours indicted that AMD would not release new cards with their new architecture until 2014. But AMD have gone to press stating Radeon HD 8000 will be with us by the end of 2013...

Computerworld states that AMD is sure to release a whole new Radeon HD-8000 series based upon new architecture. This means AMD will be rolling out their new high-end graphics cards later this year.

Vice-president of AMD: "Let me be clear: the new products will be based on a new architecture." This means their new high-end GPU's will be rolling out at the end of 2013.

One of their current most powerful cards, the HD 7970, was released at the end of 2011. Due to this, a release of a new series was already expected to take place early 2013, whereas in reality this will be at the end of 2013.

AMD already said to be focusing on improving and optimizing their 7000-series before releasing their new series of GPU's. They will continue working on new driver updates which should improve the overall performance of their current GPU's.

Sony Xperia Z used as an underwater cam, makes a cool 3 minute video

Most smartphones don’t usually fancy dipping their toes in swimming pools, but not the Sony Xperia Z. The flagship smartphone was taken for some underwater action by an early adopter.

With its IP57 certification, the Xperia Z doesn’t even break a sweat shooting the 3-minute underwater video.

The video looks pretty remarkable, and as an added bonus the microphone manages to capture some pretty clear underwater sounds as well.

The owner of Sony’s latest flagship advises that if you take your Xperia Z on such an adventure, just hit the video recording button prior to jumping in the water, as the touchscreen, understandably, doesn’t work underwater.

Anyhow, here’s the video itself.

Opera acquires Skyfire Labs for $155 million

Opera has announced that it has acquired Skyfire Labs, the company that made the Skyfire browser for mobile, for $155 million. The acquisition will allow Opera access to Skyfire’s Rocket Optimizer Software.

Rocket Optimizer works by compressing multimedia content such as images and videos on web pages on Skyfire’s servers and then sending them to the device, thus considerably reducing the bandwidth requirement on your device and the strain on mobile networks. This is similar to the way Opera Mini browser works, but Rocket Optimizer can also work with videos, something no other browser can.

This, coupled with Opera’s already excellent cloud compression, means you can expect even better performance and functionality from Opera’s mobile browsers in future. The company also recently announced that they will be slowly moving towards the WebKit engine for their desktop and mobile browsers, so things are certainly looking up for the company.

ASUS unveils 10-inch MeMo Pad Smart in Thailand

Asus has officially unveiled the rumored 10″ Memo Pad Smart ME301T at the Thailand Mobile Expo. Asus also is expected to showcase the tablet at the upcoming Mobile World Congress.

Asus Memo Pad Smart comes out with a 10.1″ WXGA display, 1.2 GHz quad-core Nvidia Tegra 3 processor along with 1 GB RAM, 16 GB inbuilt memory and microSD card support. The tablet has a 5-megapixel rear camera, 1.2-megapixel front camera and runs on Android 4.1 Jelly Bean.

A review of the Asus Memo Pad Smart is already available on YouTube.




The 9mm thick tablet is priced at THB10,900 (about $360) and will be available in white, blue and pink color variants.

Game of the year announced by Dice Submit

The D.I.C.E. Summit; a large annual event where all the big names in gaming gather to discuss the industry, the games, the successes and failures.

Last night was all about the successes though, as the D.I.C.E. Award winners were announced...



The full list of award winners:

Action Game of the Year - Borderlands 2 (Gearbox Software)

Mobile Game of the Year - Hero Academy (Robot Entertainment)

Handheld Game of the Year - Paper Mario Sticker Star (Intelligent Systems)

Outstanding Achievement in Original Music Composition - Journey (thatgamecompany)

Outstanding Achievement in Sound Design - Journey (thatgamecompany)

Outstanding Achievement in Story - The Walking Dead (Telltale Games)

Outstanding Character Performance - The Walking Dead: Lee Everett (Telltale Games)

Downloadable Game of the Year - The Walking Dead (Telltale Games)

Casual Game of the Year - Journey (thatgamecompany)

Web Based Game of the Year - SimCity Social (Maxis, Playfish)

Family Game of the Year - Skylanders Giants (Toys for Bob)

Role-Playing/Massively Multiplayer Game of the Year - Mass Effect 3 (Bioware)

Strategy/Simulation Game of the Year - XCOM: Enemy Unknown (Firaxis Games)

Outstanding Innovation in Gaming - Journey (thatgamecompany)

Sports Game of the Year - FIFA Soccer 13 (EA Canada)

Racing Game of the Year - Need for Speed Most Wanted (Criterion Games)

Fighting Game of the Year - PlayStation All-Stars Battle Royale (SuperBot Entertainment)

Outstanding Achievement in Online Gameplay - Journey (thatgamecompany)

Outstanding Achievement in Connectivity - Halo 4 (343 Industries)

Outstanding Achievement in Animation - Assassin's Creed III (Ubisoft)

Outstanding Achievement in Art Direction - Journey (thatgamecompany)

Outstanding Achievement in Visual Engineering - Halo 4 (343 Industries)

Outstanding Achievement in Gameplay Engineering - XCOM: Enemy Unknown (Firaxis Games)

Adventure Game of the Year - The Walking Dead (Telltale Games)

Outstanding Achievement in Game Direction - Journey (thatgamecompany)

Game of the Year - Journey (thatgamecompany)

Many games were nominated, and there were some expected winners, such as Borderlands 2 for Action Game of the Year, and Mass Effect 3 as best RolePlaying/Massively Multiplayer Game of the Year. However, the real surprise is Journey - winning 8 awards and taking Game of the Year.

The Journey studio, ThatGameCompany, actually went bankrupt before releasing the game, but these awards prove that the game was a fantastic success for the developers.